Sen. Anthony Kern has rooted out yet another conspiracy: No right turn on red

Is there no end to the tyranny we face?

According to Sen. Anthony Kern, there is a move afoot by Arizona’s cities and towns to stop drivers from turning right on a red light.

And because anything that makes it more difficult to lurch to the right must be a government conspiracy, Kern’s got a bill to combat it ...

By slathering on a new layer of bureaucratic rules because, as he says …

“Everything’s less government with me."

Yeah, don’t ask me to explain that one.

Kern wants to stop 'Marxist' ideas

Kern, R-Glendale, is one of the Legislature’s leading conservative lights, a MAGA man who, I must say, is having a heck of a year.

When he’s not turning his back on Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs (during her State of the State address) or campaigning to move up the political food chain (in Congress) or awaiting word on whether he’s going to jail (as a fake elector), Kern is donning his armor to battle the forces of evil.

From what I can tell, Kern is against clean air, state universities and democracy — at least when it comes to selecting the nation’s president.

His Senate Bill 1195 would bar any government agency from promoting “Marxist” ideas. You know, “anti-freedom” stuff like biking or riding a bus to work or eating less meat or reducing greenhouse gas emissions or researching climate change.

Should Kern’s bill become law, you’ll be able to sue any government tyrant who tries to tell you how many clothes you can buy. (The fact that there is no government tyrant telling you how many clothes you can buy is apparently beside the point.)

Bills create regulations that already exist

Kern says he’s “not a university guy,” which seems to me an understatement.

When he’s not applauding talk of gutting these “anti-American indoctrination camps,” as he calls them, or urging donors to pull back their money from Arizona State University, he’s proposing new laws that don’t actually do much of anything.

His SB 1304 would require the Arizona Board of Regents to adopt a “free expression policy” so university students and faculty can express their opinions without penalty. Never mind that the Board of Regents already has a free expression policy along with non-discrimination and anti-harassment policy.

His SB 1477 would require the Board of Regents to create a “grade challenge department” for students who think they were given a bad grade due to their political viewpoint. Never mind that the Board of Regents already has a process for challenging grades.

Kern uses his office: For payback against Kris Mayes

His Senate Concurrent Resolution 1014 would give the Legislature the authority to determine which presidential candidate wins Arizona’s vote.

Never mind your vote.

Then again, he already served as a fake elector, avowing that he’d been “duly elected” to cast Arizona’s electoral votes for the guy who didn’t win in 2020.

Which cities are killing right turns on red?

Now he’s turned his narrowed eye to traffic intersections — specifically intersections posted with a sign that says you can’t turn right when the light is red.

“Right now, cities and towns are kind of willy-nilly putting up no right on red, no right on red. And there’s no study being done, and it’s kind of a pain in the rear end, so I decided to run the bill,” he told the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee last week.

His Senate Bill 1299 would require an engineering study before a city could ban a right turn on red. Before posting a sign, a registered engineer would have to evaluate the intersection and determine that allowing a right turn on red is unsafe “either at all times or on specific days and times” and to document his or her findings.

The bill passed the Senate on a party line vote and cleared the House Transportation Committee with both Republican and some Democratic support.

Never mind that the Arizona Department of Transportation already has a list of protocols for when right turns on red may be forbidden — one that requires the approval of a regional traffic engineer.

Or that there doesn’t seem to be a push on to deny us the right to turn right.

If there was a plot afoot, surely Kern could have named at least one city — or even one intersection — where our rights have been willy-nilly nullified.

To Kern, everything is a conspiracy

Instead, Kern said he got the idea for the bill from a constituent, Jay Beeber, the executive director of policy for the National Motorists Association, an advocacy organization for drivers.

Beeber told the committee he didn’t know if any Arizona cities were willy-nilly forbidding right turns on red. But he did tick off a list of cities not in Arizona that are nixing right turns on red. Among them: Berkeley, Calif., San Francisco, Indianapolis and Washington D.C.

During the 1970s energy crisis, the U.S. began allowing right turns on red to cut down on idling at stop lights. In recent years, a few U.S. cities have begun cracking down in congested areas and even citywide, citing a concern for pedestrian and bicyclist safety

Beeber, however, doesn’t buy it.

“What’s really behind this movement is part of the agenda to make driving as miserable and as difficult as possible so people don’t drive so much,” Beeber told CBS News in November.

In other words, it’s a conspiracy.

And just as with the Marxists who are plotting to take away our meat and our clothes, Kern is all over the Arizona cities that apparently are plotting to take away our God-given right to turn right.

Never mind that he can’t name a single one.

Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter, at @LaurieRoberts or on Threads at laurierobertsaz.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Fake elector Anthony Kern moves on to a fake road conspiracy